In order to maintain or grow their market share, manufacturers of disposable absorbent articles such as disposable diapers and absorbent pants must continue to discover and develop improvements to materials, components and features that affect aspects such as containment, absorbency, comfort, fit and appearance. Absorbent pants are manufactured in smaller sizes to be used as, e.g., pull-on diapers and toilet training pants for young children, and in larger sizes to be used as, e.g., undergarments for persons such as adults or older children suffering from incontinence. In some applications the consumer and/or wearer may prefer that the article have an appearance and feel resembling ordinary underwear when worn.
A particular type of absorbent pant design currently marketed is sometimes called the “balloon” pant. The balloon pant design usually includes a central absorbent chassis including the absorbent core and an elastic belt. The elastic belt is usually relatively wide (in the longitudinal direction) and elastically stretchable in the lateral direction. It entirely encircles the wearer's waist, and thereby covers a relatively large amount of the wearer's skin, and also makes up a relatively large portion of the visible outside surfaces of the pant. The belt is often formed of two layers of nonwoven web sandwiching one or more elastic members such as a plurality of laterally-oriented strands or strips of elastomeric material, or a section of elastomeric film, elastomeric scrim or elastomeric nonwoven. It is common among such designs that, in manufacture, the elastic member(s) are sandwiched between the nonwoven web layers while in a strained condition.
The absorbent core structure that is part of the central chassis portion plays an important role in containment and absorbency of exudates, as well as in comfort, fit and appearance of the article when worn. In recent years, absorbent core designs have progressed toward structures with relatively higher proportions by weight of absorbent polymer particles and lower proportions of absorbent fiber (e.g., cellulose fiber), resulting in structures that are thinner than absorbent core designs of earlier years and enabling manufacture of products that are less bulky and more closely-fitting (e.g., more underwear-like) when dry. The latter structures, however, can be slower in liquid acquisition rate, and because of their greater proportions of absorbent polymer particles, can become saggy, bulky and gelatinous when wetted. To address these issues, absorbent structures including longitudinally-oriented channels have been developed. Appropriately located and structured longitudinal channels can help distribute liquid along deposits of absorbent polymer particles along the length of the absorbent core, and thereby help improve acquisition rate. They also can help reduce chances of a saggy and bulky appearance of the article when wetted, by providing longitudinal structural rigidity through the crotch region of the article resulting from pressure within the wetted absorbent polymer particle deposits between the channels.
However, it has been discovered that this structural rigidity may have undesirable effects on appearance, fit and and/or comfort. In particular, the longitudinal structural rigidity can cause the front and/or rear regions of the absorbent core to tend to bulge outwardly from the wearer's body in the front and/or rear, resulting in bulky protrusion(s) that can create an unsightly appearance and adversely impact comfort.
Thus, there continues to be room for improvements in absorbent pant design that enable realization of the benefits of various developments to date while mitigating adverse effects of these features, both when the pant is dry, and after it is wetted.